Break by Aracelis Girmay

Break

 

When the boys are carnivals

we gather round them in the dark room

& they make their noise while drums

ricochet against their bodies & thin air

below the white ceiling hung up like a moon

& it is California, the desert. I am driving in a car,

clapping my hands for the beautiful windmills,

one of whom is my brother, spinning,

on a hillside in the garage

with other boys he’ll grow old with, throw back.

How they throw back their bodies

on the cardboard floor, then spring-to, flying

like the heads of hammers hitting strings

inside of a piano.

                                  Again, again.

This is how they fall & get back up. One

who was thrown out by his father. One

who carries death with him like a balloon

tied to his wrist. One whose heart will break.

One whose grandmother will forget his name.

One whose eye will close. One who stood

beside his mother’s body in a green hospital. One.

Kick up against the air to touch the earth.

See him fall, then get back up.

Then get back up.